This summer Pope Francis will launch his encyclical on

climate change and the environment. Addressing 1.2

billion members of the Roman Catholic Church, 400,000

priests, world leaders, international agencies, scientists

and technology developers and, indeed, every human

being on the planet, it cannot but be revolutionary. It will

be carefully balanced, scientifically sound, and very direct.

A repeated phrase of Pope Francis recently has been “If

we destroy Creation... Creation will destroy us.”

The encyclical – the first of this Pope’s incumbency –

will create a firm moral foundation for the landmark

environmental gatherings that follow this year. He will

address the joint session of U.S. Congress in September,

then address the United Nations General Assembly in

New York, and finally get his message across at the

game-changing U.N. Climate Conference in Paris in

December.

Global justiceThe ethical thrust of the Pope’s message is that humanity

and the whole web of life face a grave threat which

humans are responsible for, and humans are responsible

for rectifying the situation. No doubt he will emphasize the

global injustice that the poorest people are least

responsible for climate change but are, and will be

increasingly, most affected by it.

As Jeff Nesbit, the National Science Foundation’s

director of legislative and public affairs in the Bush and

Obama administrations, says: “That sort of all-across-the-

world public awareness around a threat (one that isn’t the

result of military conflicts between nation states) has never

truly happened before in our history as a species on

Earth, but it’s happening now.”

Climate change and technologiesClimate change has been caused by human use of now

outdated ‘dirty technologies’, using fossil fuels (oil, coal,

gas) as the energy source. Emissions of carbon dioxide

and methane in particular have thickened the atmospheric

blanket around the Earth, trapping the sun’s heat. The

gradual rise in heat damages eco-systems, causes

drought, floods, soil erosion, sea level rise, and stronger

hurricanes and storms. This poses an escalating threat to

coastal mega-cities and undermines agricultural capacity.

While the old technologies were implicated in the

planetary damage, now emerging technologies such as

nanomaterials, solar and wind energy will help a transition

to a low-carbon economy. Other new technologies that

have emerged in the last decade – including super-

computers and telecommunications – can now measure

and transmit knowledge of the damaging impacts with

greater predictability and accuracy than ever before.

However, technology alone can achieve nothing. It can

have an effect only if the moral and political will can be

generated. Pope Francis is playing a huge part in

generating this will.

An alliance for action?People of all faiths and none will have to come together,

as they are now beginning to do, in order to really rise to

the global challenge of climate change. For statements on

climate change by all religions, including Christianity,

Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism, go to the Yale

University website: ‘Forum on Religion and Ecology’

http://fore.yale.edu/publications/statements/.

Further reading• Pledge: In the USA the organisation Catholic Climate

Change Covenant has launched a ‘St Francis Pledge

to Care for Creation’,

http://catholicclimatecovenant.org

• Earth Day was on 22nd April 2015:

http://www.earthday.org/

• Preview of the encyclical: Market Watch, 13th April

2015, http://www.marketwatch.com/story/pope-

franciss-new-climate-change-encyclical-sneak-

preview-2015-04-09

• Jeff Nesbitt, in U.S.NEWS report, ‘Faith Matters’

section: http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/faith-

matters/2015/04/16/why-pope-francis-climate-

change-encyclical-is-so-important

CBETBulletinNewsletter for the Centre for Bioethics & Emerging Technologies

Issue 10Spring/Summer 2015www.stmarys.ac.uk

At a glanceThe Pope’s Climate Change Revolution 1Three-Parent Babies? 2Science and Faith 3Contemporary Challenges in Mental Health 4

CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015 | 14 | CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015

The Pope’s ClimateChange RevolutionThe Encyclical on EnvironmentProf Geoff Hunt

Some philosophical thoughts on encouraging or assisting suicide Prof David A Jones

Continued page 2 >

Centre for Bioethics & Emerging Technologies St Mary's University Waldegrave Road, Strawberry HillTwickenham TW1 4SX

Tel: 020 8240 4250 Fax: 020 8240 2362www.smuc.ac.uk/cbet

The question of whether suicide is ever something to be advocated as good or right or

honourable is one with which philosophers have struggled down the centuries. To take

such terrible action requires a certain kind of courage (and someone may well be

restrained from suicide by fear), but Aristotle (384–322 BCE) and others after him have

thought that suicide ultimately embodies a failure of courage. It takes more courage to

live. Likewise Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), who is the philosopher who has most exalted

the right and duty of human beings to make autonomous moral choices, regarded suicide

as a failure to respect human nature in one’s own case: not an act of autonomy but a

failure to respect autonomy.

Suicide, moralism and mental ill health These classical philosophical accounts seem distant from the way that suicide is typically

framed in modern culture. Remarks like those of Aristotle or Kant can seem excessively

judgmental or moralistic, insufficiently aware of the extent to which suicide is typically the

expression of a disturbed mind, a matter of mental (ill) health and not simply one of moral

(bad) judgement.

Considerations about suicide from the perspective of mental health represents an

advance in understanding, and one that is more important for at least some practical

purposes than the classical arguments against suicide. The assistance of suicide remains

a crime not simply because suicide may be an expression of weakness or selfishness, or

a failure to respect humanity in oneself. The assistance of suicide is a crime above all

because suicide is a form of self-harm typically associated with mental ill-health, and

encouraging or facilitating a suicide is thus a failure of care for someone who is suicidal. If

a detention centre for asylum seekers had witnessed a spate of suicides it would be no

moral defence for the authorities to say, ‘suicide is a personal matter’.

In praise of suicidePraising suicide as an expression of personal choice or autonomy suffers from two

problems. In the first place it underplays the extent to which suicide is a mental-health

issue and, just as much as classic views, suffers from assuming that suicide is, in general

or for the most part, the act of a fully rational person. Advocating suicide as an

expression of autonomy or a ‘right’ is just another kind of moralism. It normalises and

thus effectively encourages or promotes suicide.

In the second place, inasmuch as suicide can be understood as a moral or rational

choice, it is inadequate to see it only as a matter of personal choice. This is to neglect the

weight of the moral and philosophical tradition, from Aristotle to Kant, and to disguise or

minimise the adverse effects of suicide on those left behind and indeed on the whole of

society (if suicide becomes acceptable for a society then this undermines that society’s

understanding of human dignity, including the dignity inherent in human life itself).

It may be argued that legalising physician assisted suicide would ameliorate some of

the harms of unregulated suicide, in that, even if people still died, their deaths would be

less painful and less isolated and bereaved relatives would be less traumatised. Not only

does this attempted counter argument ignore the problem of society’s complicity in self-

harm but it seems to assume that legalising assisted suicide makes other, worse kinds of

suicide less likely. However, there is no evidence for this. Both Oregon and Washington

have seen an increase in unregulated suicide since introducing this kind of legislation.

In conclusionPhilosophical and mental health considerations, and the negative consequences which

follow from suicide (at least generally and for the most part), constitute a strong argument

in favour of finding strategies for suicide prevention. Such strategies run counter to the

rationale and likely consequences of the legalisation of assisted suicide.

The following remarks are taken from written evidence by Professor David Albert Jones of

CBET in advance of oral evidence he gave before the Scottish Parliament Health and

Sport Committee on 20th January 2015.

Contemporary challenges in mental health Dr Pia Matthews

At St Mary’s last year we successfully launched a new initiative based on the strategy, ‘no

health without mental health’. Our inaugural conference on mental health, hosted by

InSpiRe in co-operation with CBET, was entitled Contemporary Challenges in Mental

Health Ministry.

That conference was part of the drive to raise awareness of mental health issues and

to address issues of stigma and discrimination. The feedback from those who attended

the conference was that this could mark the beginning of a bigger conversation and there

emerged a clear sense of the need for ‘more’. So the next question for CBET and

InSpiRe was how to carry on and also extend the conversation. The advantage of the

conference was that it brought people engaged on the same enterprise together, and it

gave an opportunity for those present to give a steer to ways forward.

This year’s conference, Mental Well-Being: Listening with Compassion, is in

collaboration with the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales, The South London and

Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, the Multi-faith Chaplaincy of the University of Surrey and

Durham University’s Project for Spirituality, Theology and Health. The conference will

include a reflection from Bishop Moth, bishop elect for the Diocese of Arundel and

Brighton, on compassion in mercy with reference to Pope Francis’s encyclical, Evangelii

Gaudium. Sr Mairead Quigley will lead on group listening. These will be followed by a

workshop on recovery and spirituality and CBET’s Dr Trevor Stammers will be offering a

workshop on poetry and compassion. The final speaker will be Professor Chris Cooke

who has written on spirituality and mental health, recently focusing on theological and

psychotherapeutic engagement with mental well-being. (For more details and booking,

contact Steph Modak at inspire@stmarys.ac.uk; booking form:

www.stmarys.ac.uk/listening-with-compassion).

In conjunction with what we hope will become an annual conference, CBET and

InSpiRe will be organising a series of study days. The first one will be on mental health

and young people at university. The aim of all of these days is to begin the conversation

and involve as many people as possible in what is, after all, a subject that affects us all.

However, by exploring poetry and compassion, Dr Trevor Stammers indicates that the

mental health conversation is not simply an academic exercise. There is much to be

gained from using the insights and different approaches of poetry, music, art, drama,

story, in the conversation. This is not new, and there has been much research on the

importance of, for example, art therapy. By bringing all of these different areas into the

conversation I hope that we will add breadth and depth to reflection to mental well-being.

CBET Bulletin Spring-Summer 2015_MAY15_PROOF 11/05/2015 11:31 Page 1

Both UK Houses of Parliament voted overwhelmingly in

February this year, to change the law to allow three- and

four-parent IVF techniques to be used in what will be de

facto clinical human trials, once the Human Fertilisation &

Embryology Authority (HFEA) is satisfied the techniques

are safe. Whilst the aim of these trials is laudable in

intending to prevent the transmission of debilitating and

often fatal mitochondrial diseases, many cell biologists and

bioethicists remain concerned about these techniques.

I have been particularly alarmed about the

manipulation of language being utilised by its champions in

the UK and though I will continue to refer to it as

“3 or 4 parent IVF” since this is more accurate than

“mitochondrial transfer” (the mother’s egg nucleus is

what is transferred), the US term, MMT mitochondrial

manipulation techniques (MMTs) is also a reasonable

alternative.

International debate

Both before and after the Government votes, I have

travelled widely in the past few months to speak about the

issue and will continue to do so no doubt as the first HFEA

licence is eventually given. I had a very lively debate on Al

Jazeera television in February followed by a visit to

address the very first National Bioethics Conference in

Oman in March. This was followed by an opportunity to

present my concerns at the European Parliament a few

weeks later. In both Oman and at the EU, I discovered no

dissent to the arguments I put forward at all and there

appears to be worldwide concern that the UK has crossed

an important ethical boundary in permitting a procedure

which will clearly alter the germline, making changes which

will be passed down the generations. Only in the UK, it

seems, is there the confidence that we know enough to

try attempt the techniques in humans.

I suspect the path will not be as easy as its champions

have portrayed and there may well be legal challenges in

the EU as well as potential “failures” ending in abortion or

miscarriage before a child without the disease is eventually

born, if indeed it does prove possible at all. A well-

reasoned dissenting view is necessary concerning MMTs

both in the UK and internationally. I travel next to Vienna

for a conference this summer to continue to urge other

nations to wait before following the UK’s ill-advised and

premature lead.

• UK Election: The Catholic Bishops of England and

Wales have called on the Church community to

safeguard God’s gift of creation for the benefit of all

in a letter sent to parishes ahead of the general

election. www.cafod.org.uk/News/Campaigning-

news/Bishops-election-letter

• The Pontifical Academy of Sciences of the Roman

Catholic Church is holding a workshop on climate

change on April 28, 2015 at the Vatican:

www.casinapioiv.va/content/dam/accademia/

booklet/booklet_earth.pdf

• ‘New Scientist’ explains climate change:

www.newscientist.com/topic/climate-change

The Pope’s Climate Change Revolution Further Reading continued from page 1 ...

CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015 | 32 | CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015

Physicist joins St Mary’s

CBET is delighted to have the support

and collaboration of St Mary’s new

physicist, Dr Elisabetta Canetta. She

graduated from the Department of

Physics of the Università di Bologna,

Bologna (Italy) with an MPhys in

Theoretical Nuclear Physics. In 2004,

she obtained a PhD in Experimental Biophysics from the

Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble (France) with a thesis

entitled “Micromanipulation of living cells by using an

AFM spectrometer: Application to cancer”.

The same year, Dr Canetta moved to the UK where

she has spent seven years working as a Research Fellow

in nanobiophysics and soft matter at the University of

Abertay Dundee, the University of Surrey, and the

University of St Andrews. In 2011, Dr Canetta moved to

the School of Biosciences of Cardiff University as a

Lecturer in Biophotonics and in 2013 she joined the

School of Sport, Health, and Applied Science of

St Mary’s University as Lecturer in Physics on the BSc

(Hon) Applied Physics undergraduate course. She is

currently a Senior Lecturer in Physics and Programme

Director of the BSc (Hon) Applied Physics degree.

Theory and practiceAs a theoretical nuclear physicist, Dr Canetta has

investigated the regular and chaotic motions of heavy-

nuclei. As a nanobiophysicist, Dr Canetta’s experience

lies in the application of physics to life sciences. Her main

research interest concerns the study of the

nanostructural, nanomechanical (Atomic Force

Microscopy) and biochemical (Confocal and Modulated

Raman Spectroscopy) differences between normal and

cancer cells, non-pathogenic and pathogenic yeasts,

undifferentiated and differentiated stem cells and

progenitor cells, and the characterisation of advanced

materials at the nanoscale. She is also interested in the

investigation of protein-protein interactions and DNA

structures.

Science, ethics and religionRecently, Dr Canetta has also started working on the

relationship between nanotechnology and ethics and on

the history and philosophy of physics with a particular

interest for “Quantum Physics-Theology inter-

relationship”, “Newton the theologian”, and “Einstein’s

cosmic religion”. She and Prof Hunt are currently

collaborating on a review article on ‘Food irradiation and

polymer nanomaterials’, specially commissioned by the

journal ‘Nanobiomedicine’.

Three-Parent Babies? Dr Trevor Stammers

Introducing Dr Elisabetta Canetta

CBET News and Events Continued

Mindfulness funding

CBET has won a £50,000 grant in collaboration with the

University of Surrey. The grant from Health Education

Kent, Surrey and Sussex is for a research project on the

effectiveness of mindfulness training for professional

nurses, and the sum of £15,000 goes to Prof Hunt,

director of CBET, for the delivery of the experimental

training programme, while the remainder goes to project

partner Prof Ann Gallagher and research assistant Ms Kit

Tapson, both of the University of Surrey, to develop

research methods and conduct an expert Delphi Panel

exercise. The research will be conducted with the

cooperation of Frimley Park NHS Hospital.

Switzerland collaborationA decision-making tool called REPVAD, designed by Prof

Hunt, has been used effectively by nurse educators and

managers for some years in hospitals in Switzerland.

Now the tool is being fine-tuned for publication drawing

on real-life clinical case studies by Hunt in collaboration

with Christine Merzeder and Iren Bischofberger. REPVAD

stands for ‘Reasoning, Evidence, Procedures, Values,

Attitudes, Defences’ and is applied in small group

discussions to critical incidents to gain an understanding

of how good and bad decisions are made in healthcare

scenarios. Merzeder is Clinical Coordinator ANP,

Paracelsus-recovery.com, Health and Social care

consultant, lecturer and academic modules developer,

Kalaidos University of Applied Sciences, Department of

Health Sciences, Zurich/Switzerland; and Bischofberger

is Program Director, MSc in Nursing, and Vice Dean of

the same Department at Kalaidos University.

Interdisciplinary conference on foodFollowing its mission of exploring ethics in an

interdisciplinary setting CBET contributed to ‘Digesting

Modernity: An Interdisciplinary Study of Food’ hosted by

St Mary’s University. Keynote speaker for the conference

was Senior Lecturer in History at Liverpool Hope

University, Dr Bryce Evans, who gave a paper on

communal kitchens in Peru. St Mary’s Professor of

English, Prof Allan Simmons, gave the Plenary Paper

which surveyed food in literature from the Brothers

Grimm to George Orwell. CBET’s Prof Hunt gave a paper

on the ethics of food production and the adverse

implications for society at large of moving from ‘intimate

food production’ to ‘alienated food production’, in which

people generally have no idea how to produce food or

how the food they eat is technologically shaped and

engineered. St Mary’s PhD Student and organiser of the

conference, Kim Salmons said, “Everyone went away

singing the praises of St Mary’s University and

demanding that the event become an annual one.”

CBET-Hospice collaborationCBET recently partnered with local charity Princess Alice

Hospice to deliver a workshop on the issues surrounding

care for dying patients. ‘Making Sense of Decisions at

the End of Life’ was the theme of the Annual Ethics

Study Day run by the Princess Alice Hospice in Esher,

Surrey on Tuesday 13th January. Continued over >

CBET NEWS and EVENTS

The ‘Science and Faith’ one-day

workshop at St Mary’s (18th May),

is organised by the Applied Physics

Department in collaboration with the

Chaplaincy and the Theology

Department

This workshop aims to facilitate the dialogue between

scientists of different faiths or no-faith, theologians and

philosophers to promote the “renaissance” of the lost

synergy between science, theology, and philosophy.

Think about the greatest minds of all times, they never

made any distinction between their scientific, theological

and philosophical studies. They were investigating

scientific phenomena and trying to unravel natural truths

using scientific and philosophical tools and with the only

aim of understanding God. They were “natural

philosophers”. Think about Isaac Newton, who devoted

his life to the study of mechanics and calculus, alchemy

and the Bible; René Descartes to whom we owe the

concepts of analytical geometry but also of the freedom

of God’s act of creation, and of rationalism; Gottfried

Leibniz, who developed mathematical calculus (in

particular integration and differentiation) and who gave us

one of the most beautiful and fascinating philosophical

concepts: the “monads”.

Ancient and contemporary

Other notable examples of natural philosophers are

Aristotle, one of the greatest scientists of ancient Greece

whose interests spanned from physics to biology, but

also the father of the theory of logic, and his teacher,

Plato, who laid the foundations of most of western

philosophy and science and whose interests spanned

from physics and mathematics to religion and philosophy.

More recently, the developments of the theory of relativity

and of quantum physics were the last notable offspring of

the marriage between science and religion (do not forget

Einstein’s “cosmic religion”). This workshop is also part of

a series of initiatives to strengthen the Catholic identity of

St Mary’s University and to rediscover “that joy of

searching for, discovering and communicating truth in

every field of knowledge” (Encyclical “Ex Corde

Ecclesiae” – 15th August 1990).

The speakers

The Science and Faith workshop is constituted of four

workshops in which the relationship between science and

faith is explored from the points of view of scientists,

theologians and philosophers. Drs Elisabetta Canetta and

Ali Mozaffari (Applied Physics Department – St Mary’s

University) are physicists who approach physics with a

religious insight. Dr Anthony Towey (Aquinas Centre –

St Mary’s University) is interested in theological pedagogy.

Dr Ignacio Silva (Iain Ramsey Centre for Science and

Religion – Oxford University) has interests in the science-

religion interface and the philosophy of science with

particular emphasis on the issues regarding the Divine

Action. CBET bio-ethicists, Prof Geoffrey Hunt

(philosopher) and Dr Trevor Stammers (medical doctor),

have interests lying in the limits of science and the

relationship between science and religion, respectively. Dr

Stephen Bullivant (Theology Department – St Mary’s

University) has a particular interest in the relationship

between theology and Darwinism, and a more general

interest in the ways in which appeals to 'science' are

used as justifications for atheism.

Science and FaithDr Elisabetta CanettaThe hospice delivers palliative and end of life care and

support for patients and their families, and the workshop

provided staff with the opportunity to openly discuss the

difficulties they face in their roles. Director of CBET, Prof

Geoffrey Hunt, who is also the co-chair of the Hospice’s

Clinical Ethics Group, opened the workshop with a

presentation on Engaged Ethics which presented a

conceptual tool for the analysis of interdisciplinary decision-

making in a hospice setting. A wide range of professionals,

including palliative care doctors and nurses, dieticians,

speech therapists and physiotherapists, participated in the

discussion of case studies led by Dr Craig Gannon, Deputy

Director of the Hospice, and Prof Ann Gallagher of the

University of Surrey.

Dr Gannon said, “The Annual Ethics Study Day proved

to be a hugely enjoyable and highly educational day for

presenters and attendees alike. It was brilliant to then see

the participants using Professor Hunt’s ethics concepts,

e.g., the need for ‘timeliness’, spontaneously and to great

effect in the group-work later in the day. The whole event

was highly evaluated, emphasising the importance of

working together, linking hospice and academic colleagues

to promote sound ethical decision making in our clinical

practice.”

CBET PhD successCBET congratulates its ethics doctoral candidate, Anthony

McCarthy for the award by St Mary’s in March of the PhD

for his thesis on ‘Ethical Sex: Sexual Choices and their

Nature and Meaning’.

Dr McCarthy’s thesis aims to establish which kinds of

sexual choices are morally good and which, in contrast, are

morally bad. What are the moral conditions that are needed

in order for sexual choices to be virtuous and contribute to

human flourishing? In exploring that question, the related

question is examined of why sex ‘matters’ morally and

whether this is an area of life that is in some sense ‘special’

(requiring, for example, a specific virtue).

CBET Bulletin Spring-Summer 2015_MAY15_PROOF 11/05/2015 11:31 Page 2

Both UK Houses of Parliament voted overwhelmingly in

February this year, to change the law to allow three- and

four-parent IVF techniques to be used in what will be de

facto clinical human trials, once the Human Fertilisation &

Embryology Authority (HFEA) is satisfied the techniques

are safe. Whilst the aim of these trials is laudable in

intending to prevent the transmission of debilitating and

often fatal mitochondrial diseases, many cell biologists and

bioethicists remain concerned about these techniques.

I have been particularly alarmed about the

manipulation of language being utilised by its champions in

the UK and though I will continue to refer to it as

“3 or 4 parent IVF” since this is more accurate than

“mitochondrial transfer” (the mother’s egg nucleus is

what is transferred), the US term, MMT mitochondrial

manipulation techniques (MMTs) is also a reasonable

alternative.

International debate

Both before and after the Government votes, I have

travelled widely in the past few months to speak about the

issue and will continue to do so no doubt as the first HFEA

licence is eventually given. I had a very lively debate on Al

Jazeera television in February followed by a visit to

address the very first National Bioethics Conference in

Oman in March. This was followed by an opportunity to

present my concerns at the European Parliament a few

weeks later. In both Oman and at the EU, I discovered no

dissent to the arguments I put forward at all and there

appears to be worldwide concern that the UK has crossed

an important ethical boundary in permitting a procedure

which will clearly alter the germline, making changes which

will be passed down the generations. Only in the UK, it

seems, is there the confidence that we know enough to

try attempt the techniques in humans.

I suspect the path will not be as easy as its champions

have portrayed and there may well be legal challenges in

the EU as well as potential “failures” ending in abortion or

miscarriage before a child without the disease is eventually

born, if indeed it does prove possible at all. A well-

reasoned dissenting view is necessary concerning MMTs

both in the UK and internationally. I travel next to Vienna

for a conference this summer to continue to urge other

nations to wait before following the UK’s ill-advised and

premature lead.

• UK Election: The Catholic Bishops of England and

Wales have called on the Church community to

safeguard God’s gift of creation for the benefit of all

in a letter sent to parishes ahead of the general

election. www.cafod.org.uk/News/Campaigning-

news/Bishops-election-letter

• The Pontifical Academy of Sciences of the Roman

Catholic Church is holding a workshop on climate

change on April 28, 2015 at the Vatican:

www.casinapioiv.va/content/dam/accademia/

booklet/booklet_earth.pdf

• ‘New Scientist’ explains climate change:

www.newscientist.com/topic/climate-change

The Pope’s Climate Change Revolution Further Reading continued from page 1 ...

CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015 | 32 | CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015

Physicist joins St Mary’s

CBET is delighted to have the support

and collaboration of St Mary’s new

physicist, Dr Elisabetta Canetta. She

graduated from the Department of

Physics of the Università di Bologna,

Bologna (Italy) with an MPhys in

Theoretical Nuclear Physics. In 2004,

she obtained a PhD in Experimental Biophysics from the

Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble (France) with a thesis

entitled “Micromanipulation of living cells by using an

AFM spectrometer: Application to cancer”.

The same year, Dr Canetta moved to the UK where

she has spent seven years working as a Research Fellow

in nanobiophysics and soft matter at the University of

Abertay Dundee, the University of Surrey, and the

University of St Andrews. In 2011, Dr Canetta moved to

the School of Biosciences of Cardiff University as a

Lecturer in Biophotonics and in 2013 she joined the

School of Sport, Health, and Applied Science of

St Mary’s University as Lecturer in Physics on the BSc

(Hon) Applied Physics undergraduate course. She is

currently a Senior Lecturer in Physics and Programme

Director of the BSc (Hon) Applied Physics degree.

Theory and practiceAs a theoretical nuclear physicist, Dr Canetta has

investigated the regular and chaotic motions of heavy-

nuclei. As a nanobiophysicist, Dr Canetta’s experience

lies in the application of physics to life sciences. Her main

research interest concerns the study of the

nanostructural, nanomechanical (Atomic Force

Microscopy) and biochemical (Confocal and Modulated

Raman Spectroscopy) differences between normal and

cancer cells, non-pathogenic and pathogenic yeasts,

undifferentiated and differentiated stem cells and

progenitor cells, and the characterisation of advanced

materials at the nanoscale. She is also interested in the

investigation of protein-protein interactions and DNA

structures.

Science, ethics and religionRecently, Dr Canetta has also started working on the

relationship between nanotechnology and ethics and on

the history and philosophy of physics with a particular

interest for “Quantum Physics-Theology inter-

relationship”, “Newton the theologian”, and “Einstein’s

cosmic religion”. She and Prof Hunt are currently

collaborating on a review article on ‘Food irradiation and

polymer nanomaterials’, specially commissioned by the

journal ‘Nanobiomedicine’.

Three-Parent Babies? Dr Trevor Stammers

Introducing Dr Elisabetta Canetta

CBET News and Events Continued

Mindfulness funding

CBET has won a £50,000 grant in collaboration with the

University of Surrey. The grant from Health Education

Kent, Surrey and Sussex is for a research project on the

effectiveness of mindfulness training for professional

nurses, and the sum of £15,000 goes to Prof Hunt,

director of CBET, for the delivery of the experimental

training programme, while the remainder goes to project

partner Prof Ann Gallagher and research assistant Ms Kit

Tapson, both of the University of Surrey, to develop

research methods and conduct an expert Delphi Panel

exercise. The research will be conducted with the

cooperation of Frimley Park NHS Hospital.

Switzerland collaborationA decision-making tool called REPVAD, designed by Prof

Hunt, has been used effectively by nurse educators and

managers for some years in hospitals in Switzerland.

Now the tool is being fine-tuned for publication drawing

on real-life clinical case studies by Hunt in collaboration

with Christine Merzeder and Iren Bischofberger. REPVAD

stands for ‘Reasoning, Evidence, Procedures, Values,

Attitudes, Defences’ and is applied in small group

discussions to critical incidents to gain an understanding

of how good and bad decisions are made in healthcare

scenarios. Merzeder is Clinical Coordinator ANP,

Paracelsus-recovery.com, Health and Social care

consultant, lecturer and academic modules developer,

Kalaidos University of Applied Sciences, Department of

Health Sciences, Zurich/Switzerland; and Bischofberger

is Program Director, MSc in Nursing, and Vice Dean of

the same Department at Kalaidos University.

Interdisciplinary conference on foodFollowing its mission of exploring ethics in an

interdisciplinary setting CBET contributed to ‘Digesting

Modernity: An Interdisciplinary Study of Food’ hosted by

St Mary’s University. Keynote speaker for the conference

was Senior Lecturer in History at Liverpool Hope

University, Dr Bryce Evans, who gave a paper on

communal kitchens in Peru. St Mary’s Professor of

English, Prof Allan Simmons, gave the Plenary Paper

which surveyed food in literature from the Brothers

Grimm to George Orwell. CBET’s Prof Hunt gave a paper

on the ethics of food production and the adverse

implications for society at large of moving from ‘intimate

food production’ to ‘alienated food production’, in which

people generally have no idea how to produce food or

how the food they eat is technologically shaped and

engineered. St Mary’s PhD Student and organiser of the

conference, Kim Salmons said, “Everyone went away

singing the praises of St Mary’s University and

demanding that the event become an annual one.”

CBET-Hospice collaborationCBET recently partnered with local charity Princess Alice

Hospice to deliver a workshop on the issues surrounding

care for dying patients. ‘Making Sense of Decisions at

the End of Life’ was the theme of the Annual Ethics

Study Day run by the Princess Alice Hospice in Esher,

Surrey on Tuesday 13th January. Continued over >

CBET NEWS and EVENTS

The ‘Science and Faith’ one-day

workshop at St Mary’s (18th May),

is organised by the Applied Physics

Department in collaboration with the

Chaplaincy and the Theology

Department

This workshop aims to facilitate the dialogue between

scientists of different faiths or no-faith, theologians and

philosophers to promote the “renaissance” of the lost

synergy between science, theology, and philosophy.

Think about the greatest minds of all times, they never

made any distinction between their scientific, theological

and philosophical studies. They were investigating

scientific phenomena and trying to unravel natural truths

using scientific and philosophical tools and with the only

aim of understanding God. They were “natural

philosophers”. Think about Isaac Newton, who devoted

his life to the study of mechanics and calculus, alchemy

and the Bible; René Descartes to whom we owe the

concepts of analytical geometry but also of the freedom

of God’s act of creation, and of rationalism; Gottfried

Leibniz, who developed mathematical calculus (in

particular integration and differentiation) and who gave us

one of the most beautiful and fascinating philosophical

concepts: the “monads”.

Ancient and contemporary

Other notable examples of natural philosophers are

Aristotle, one of the greatest scientists of ancient Greece

whose interests spanned from physics to biology, but

also the father of the theory of logic, and his teacher,

Plato, who laid the foundations of most of western

philosophy and science and whose interests spanned

from physics and mathematics to religion and philosophy.

More recently, the developments of the theory of relativity

and of quantum physics were the last notable offspring of

the marriage between science and religion (do not forget

Einstein’s “cosmic religion”). This workshop is also part of

a series of initiatives to strengthen the Catholic identity of

St Mary’s University and to rediscover “that joy of

searching for, discovering and communicating truth in

every field of knowledge” (Encyclical “Ex Corde

Ecclesiae” – 15th August 1990).

The speakers

The Science and Faith workshop is constituted of four

workshops in which the relationship between science and

faith is explored from the points of view of scientists,

theologians and philosophers. Drs Elisabetta Canetta and

Ali Mozaffari (Applied Physics Department – St Mary’s

University) are physicists who approach physics with a

religious insight. Dr Anthony Towey (Aquinas Centre –

St Mary’s University) is interested in theological pedagogy.

Dr Ignacio Silva (Iain Ramsey Centre for Science and

Religion – Oxford University) has interests in the science-

religion interface and the philosophy of science with

particular emphasis on the issues regarding the Divine

Action. CBET bio-ethicists, Prof Geoffrey Hunt

(philosopher) and Dr Trevor Stammers (medical doctor),

have interests lying in the limits of science and the

relationship between science and religion, respectively. Dr

Stephen Bullivant (Theology Department – St Mary’s

University) has a particular interest in the relationship

between theology and Darwinism, and a more general

interest in the ways in which appeals to 'science' are

used as justifications for atheism.

Science and FaithDr Elisabetta CanettaThe hospice delivers palliative and end of life care and

support for patients and their families, and the workshop

provided staff with the opportunity to openly discuss the

difficulties they face in their roles. Director of CBET, Prof

Geoffrey Hunt, who is also the co-chair of the Hospice’s

Clinical Ethics Group, opened the workshop with a

presentation on Engaged Ethics which presented a

conceptual tool for the analysis of interdisciplinary decision-

making in a hospice setting. A wide range of professionals,

including palliative care doctors and nurses, dieticians,

speech therapists and physiotherapists, participated in the

discussion of case studies led by Dr Craig Gannon, Deputy

Director of the Hospice, and Prof Ann Gallagher of the

University of Surrey.

Dr Gannon said, “The Annual Ethics Study Day proved

to be a hugely enjoyable and highly educational day for

presenters and attendees alike. It was brilliant to then see

the participants using Professor Hunt’s ethics concepts,

e.g., the need for ‘timeliness’, spontaneously and to great

effect in the group-work later in the day. The whole event

was highly evaluated, emphasising the importance of

working together, linking hospice and academic colleagues

to promote sound ethical decision making in our clinical

practice.”

CBET PhD successCBET congratulates its ethics doctoral candidate, Anthony

McCarthy for the award by St Mary’s in March of the PhD

for his thesis on ‘Ethical Sex: Sexual Choices and their

Nature and Meaning’.

Dr McCarthy’s thesis aims to establish which kinds of

sexual choices are morally good and which, in contrast, are

morally bad. What are the moral conditions that are needed

in order for sexual choices to be virtuous and contribute to

human flourishing? In exploring that question, the related

question is examined of why sex ‘matters’ morally and

whether this is an area of life that is in some sense ‘special’

(requiring, for example, a specific virtue).

CBET Bulletin Spring-Summer 2015_MAY15_PROOF 11/05/2015 11:31 Page 2

This summer Pope Francis will launch his encyclical on

climate change and the environment. Addressing 1.2

billion members of the Roman Catholic Church, 400,000

priests, world leaders, international agencies, scientists

and technology developers and, indeed, every human

being on the planet, it cannot but be revolutionary. It will

be carefully balanced, scientifically sound, and very direct.

A repeated phrase of Pope Francis recently has been “If

we destroy Creation... Creation will destroy us.”

The encyclical – the first of this Pope’s incumbency –

will create a firm moral foundation for the landmark

environmental gatherings that follow this year. He will

address the joint session of U.S. Congress in September,

then address the United Nations General Assembly in

New York, and finally get his message across at the

game-changing U.N. Climate Conference in Paris in

December.

Global justiceThe ethical thrust of the Pope’s message is that humanity

and the whole web of life face a grave threat which

humans are responsible for, and humans are responsible

for rectifying the situation. No doubt he will emphasize the

global injustice that the poorest people are least

responsible for climate change but are, and will be

increasingly, most affected by it.

As Jeff Nesbit, the National Science Foundation’s

director of legislative and public affairs in the Bush and

Obama administrations, says: “That sort of all-across-the-

world public awareness around a threat (one that isn’t the

result of military conflicts between nation states) has never

truly happened before in our history as a species on

Earth, but it’s happening now.”

Climate change and technologiesClimate change has been caused by human use of now

outdated ‘dirty technologies’, using fossil fuels (oil, coal,

gas) as the energy source. Emissions of carbon dioxide

and methane in particular have thickened the atmospheric

blanket around the Earth, trapping the sun’s heat. The

gradual rise in heat damages eco-systems, causes

drought, floods, soil erosion, sea level rise, and stronger

hurricanes and storms. This poses an escalating threat to

coastal mega-cities and undermines agricultural capacity.

While the old technologies were implicated in the

planetary damage, now emerging technologies such as

nanomaterials, solar and wind energy will help a transition

to a low-carbon economy. Other new technologies that

have emerged in the last decade – including super-

computers and telecommunications – can now measure

and transmit knowledge of the damaging impacts with

greater predictability and accuracy than ever before.

However, technology alone can achieve nothing. It can

have an effect only if the moral and political will can be

generated. Pope Francis is playing a huge part in

generating this will.

An alliance for action?People of all faiths and none will have to come together,

as they are now beginning to do, in order to really rise to

the global challenge of climate change. For statements on

climate change by all religions, including Christianity,

Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism and Judaism, go to the Yale

University website: ‘Forum on Religion and Ecology’

http://fore.yale.edu/publications/statements/.

Further reading• Pledge: In the USA the organisation Catholic Climate

Change Covenant has launched a ‘St Francis Pledge

to Care for Creation’,

http://catholicclimatecovenant.org

• Earth Day was on 22nd April 2015:

http://www.earthday.org/

• Preview of the encyclical: Market Watch, 13th April

2015, http://www.marketwatch.com/story/pope-

franciss-new-climate-change-encyclical-sneak-

preview-2015-04-09

• Jeff Nesbitt, in U.S.NEWS report, ‘Faith Matters’

section: http://www.usnews.com/opinion/blogs/faith-

matters/2015/04/16/why-pope-francis-climate-

change-encyclical-is-so-important

CBETBulletinNewsletter for the Centre for Bioethics & Emerging Technologies

Issue 10Spring/Summer 2015www.stmarys.ac.uk

At a glanceThe Pope’s Climate Change Revolution 1Three-Parent Babies? 2Science and Faith 3Contemporary Challenges in Mental Health 4

CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015 | 14 | CBET Bulletin Issue 10 Spring/Summer 2015

The Pope’s ClimateChange RevolutionThe Encyclical on EnvironmentProf Geoff Hunt

Some philosophical thoughts on encouraging or assisting suicide Prof David A Jones

Continued page 2 >

Centre for Bioethics & Emerging Technologies St Mary's University Waldegrave Road, Strawberry HillTwickenham TW1 4SX

Tel: 020 8240 4250 Fax: 020 8240 2362www.smuc.ac.uk/cbet

The question of whether suicide is ever something to be advocated as good or right or

honourable is one with which philosophers have struggled down the centuries. To take

such terrible action requires a certain kind of courage (and someone may well be

restrained from suicide by fear), but Aristotle (384–322 BCE) and others after him have

thought that suicide ultimately embodies a failure of courage. It takes more courage to

live. Likewise Immanuel Kant (1724–1804), who is the philosopher who has most exalted

the right and duty of human beings to make autonomous moral choices, regarded suicide

as a failure to respect human nature in one’s own case: not an act of autonomy but a

failure to respect autonomy.

Suicide, moralism and mental ill health These classical philosophical accounts seem distant from the way that suicide is typically

framed in modern culture. Remarks like those of Aristotle or Kant can seem excessively

judgmental or moralistic, insufficiently aware of the extent to which suicide is typically the

expression of a disturbed mind, a matter of mental (ill) health and not simply one of moral

(bad) judgement.

Considerations about suicide from the perspective of mental health represents an

advance in understanding, and one that is more important for at least some practical

purposes than the classical arguments against suicide. The assistance of suicide remains

a crime not simply because suicide may be an expression of weakness or selfishness, or

a failure to respect humanity in oneself. The assistance of suicide is a crime above all

because suicide is a form of self-harm typically associated with mental ill-health, and

encouraging or facilitating a suicide is thus a failure of care for someone who is suicidal. If

a detention centre for asylum seekers had witnessed a spate of suicides it would be no

moral defence for the authorities to say, ‘suicide is a personal matter’.

In praise of suicidePraising suicide as an expression of personal choice or autonomy suffers from two

problems. In the first place it underplays the extent to which suicide is a mental-health

issue and, just as much as classic views, suffers from assuming that suicide is, in general

or for the most part, the act of a fully rational person. Advocating suicide as an

expression of autonomy or a ‘right’ is just another kind of moralism. It normalises and

thus effectively encourages or promotes suicide.

In the second place, inasmuch as suicide can be understood as a moral or rational

choice, it is inadequate to see it only as a matter of personal choice. This is to neglect the

weight of the moral and philosophical tradition, from Aristotle to Kant, and to disguise or

minimise the adverse effects of suicide on those left behind and indeed on the whole of

society (if suicide becomes acceptable for a society then this undermines that society’s

understanding of human dignity, including the dignity inherent in human life itself).

It may be argued that legalising physician assisted suicide would ameliorate some of

the harms of unregulated suicide, in that, even if people still died, their deaths would be

less painful and less isolated and bereaved relatives would be less traumatised. Not only

does this attempted counter argument ignore the problem of society’s complicity in self-

harm but it seems to assume that legalising assisted suicide makes other, worse kinds of

suicide less likely. However, there is no evidence for this. Both Oregon and Washington

have seen an increase in unregulated suicide since introducing this kind of legislation.

In conclusionPhilosophical and mental health considerations, and the negative consequences which

follow from suicide (at least generally and for the most part), constitute a strong argument

in favour of finding strategies for suicide prevention. Such strategies run counter to the

rationale and likely consequences of the legalisation of assisted suicide.

The following remarks are taken from written evidence by Professor David Albert Jones of

CBET in advance of oral evidence he gave before the Scottish Parliament Health and

Sport Committee on 20th January 2015.

Contemporary challenges in mental health Dr Pia Matthews

At St Mary’s last year we successfully launched a new initiative based on the strategy, ‘no

health without mental health’. Our inaugural conference on mental health, hosted by

InSpiRe in co-operation with CBET, was entitled Contemporary Challenges in Mental

Health Ministry.

That conference was part of the drive to raise awareness of mental health issues and

to address issues of stigma and discrimination. The feedback from those who attended

the conference was that this could mark the beginning of a bigger conversation and there

emerged a clear sense of the need for ‘more’. So the next question for CBET and

InSpiRe was how to carry on and also extend the conversation. The advantage of the

conference was that it brought people engaged on the same enterprise together, and it

gave an opportunity for those present to give a steer to ways forward.

This year’s conference, Mental Well-Being: Listening with Compassion, is in

collaboration with the Catholic Bishops of England and Wales, The South London and

Maudsley NHS Foundation Trust, the Multi-faith Chaplaincy of the University of Surrey and

Durham University’s Project for Spirituality, Theology and Health. The conference will

include a reflection from Bishop Moth, bishop elect for the Diocese of Arundel and

Brighton, on compassion in mercy with reference to Pope Francis’s encyclical, Evangelii

Gaudium. Sr Mairead Quigley will lead on group listening. These will be followed by a

workshop on recovery and spirituality and CBET’s Dr Trevor Stammers will be offering a

workshop on poetry and compassion. The final speaker will be Professor Chris Cooke

who has written on spirituality and mental health, recently focusing on theological and

psychotherapeutic engagement with mental well-being. (For more details and booking,

contact Steph Modak at inspire@stmarys.ac.uk; booking form:

www.stmarys.ac.uk/listening-with-compassion).

In conjunction with what we hope will become an annual conference, CBET and

InSpiRe will be organising a series of study days. The first one will be on mental health

and young people at university. The aim of all of these days is to begin the conversation

and involve as many people as possible in what is, after all, a subject that affects us all.

However, by exploring poetry and compassion, Dr Trevor Stammers indicates that the

mental health conversation is not simply an academic exercise. There is much to be

gained from using the insights and different approaches of poetry, music, art, drama,

story, in the conversation. This is not new, and there has been much research on the

importance of, for example, art therapy. By bringing all of these different areas into the

conversation I hope that we will add breadth and depth to reflection to mental well-being.

CBET Bulletin Spring-Summer 2015_MAY15_PROOF 11/05/2015 11:31 Page 1